Sam Anders stopped in his tracks and he turned around towards the quiet voice that had whispered his name. Kara Thrace—Starbuck—stood there in the one of the side passages leading off of Galacticas main corridors, leaning on her cane.

“Hello, Kara,” he said simply, and then he nodded at the three other Marines from Scorpia. One shrugged and then they left him behind, heading for the flight deck and the Raptor ride down to Ophiucha. “Going to slug me again?” he asked lightly . . . but the look in his eyes belied his tone.

“Frack,” the injured pilot whispered. “I’m not going to say I’m sorry,” she continued, managing to sound pissed off at coming even this close to an apology.

“Didn’t figure you would.”

Kara’s face flushed and she hotly replied, “You’re not going to make this easy are you?”

“Easy?” snarled Sam. “You want easy? How about this?” he asked as he walked up and grabbed her and kissed her—and she didn’t pull away. But he did after a long moment and then he shook his head. “I love you, Kara, but sometimes you can be a right bitch—you know?”

“I know,” the pilot whispered again. “How about . . . we start over?”

“Start over? That would mean the two of us pointing guns at each other again,” laughed Sam—and then Kara joined him. Sam lifted her up and swung her around.

“Kara, I am who—and what—I am. I cannot be anything else. Either accept that . . . or we are through.”

Mathias Lorne winced and then he nodded. “Hurts like hell, Saul,” the Admiral answered. “The Thirteen-,” he paused, “the Terrans have pain meds, but their docs say they could interfere with the implant—I’ll live, though.”

The commanding officer of Pegasus chuckled. “Well, that is a pity. With Bill retired and you out of the picture, President Adama might have appointed me as Admiral of the Fleet.”

Mathias looked up at the older man, and both smiled.

“Not bloody likely,” they both said at the same time with a laugh.

“I’m still not happy with the decision to mothball Galactica,” Saul said with a sigh. “The old girl deserves better than being cut up to supply the Terrans with jump drives for two of those American super-carriers.”

Mathias nodded as the smile vanished from his face. “We don’t have the manpower to keep her in service, Saul—and she has been worked hard. But there will be another Galactica—I promise you that.”

The older man nodded and started to say something, but then the hatch opened and instead he rose to his feet to greet the woman who entered. “Natalie,” he said warmly. “I see you have been working wonders on this miscreant.”

The Cylon grinned and she sat down next to Mathias, who hugged her tight. “That she has,” Mathias whispered. “Will you and Ellen be at the wedding?”

“Wouldn’t miss it for the world,” Saul answered—just as the phone buzzed. He lifted the phone. “Report,” he said briskly. He nodded his head and his eyes grew wide, and then he racked the phone again.

“That was Colonel Caldwell—seems like that Terran scientist Doctor Morand, your Doctor Sarris, Doctor Baltar,” he spat that name, “and Bishop have something that you need to hear, Admiral Lorne. They are in the conference room with the President and the Quorum—must be something big.”

With a groan, Mathias slowly stood—Natalie lending him her support. “We can finish this later, Saul. Distributing the crew and officers who are not resigning is going to be difficult, but . . .,” and Mathias shrugged.

“We’ll manage. We always do,” Saul answered simply. “The Colony comes first—and no one can say that with Pegasus, Aurora, and Scorpia on station we are under-defended, not with the Terran reinforcements in system.”

“First things first,” Natalie said with a twisted smile. “How do you feel about being a father again, Mat?” she asked.

Mathias’ head snapped around, as Saul began to grin. The Admiral almost fell—but both Natalie and Saul grabbed him.

The Admiral of the Colonial Fleet just stared at his Cylon fiancée and then he hugged her tight against his chest—tears of joy dripping down both their cheeks.

****************************************************

William “Husker” Adama looked out over the valley that lay before him. “I thought we would put the house in here,” he said, gesturing towards the exposed bedrock. “Solid foundation and not too far from the city. Good access to the water—but above the flood line. Plenty of space to grow. And I think that Lee said they are planning on putting the school right down there in that hollow,” he said pointing. “Walking distance.”

Laura Roslin nodded and she sighed, closing her eyes and feeling the sun and wind on her face. This place—the colony on Ophiucha—it was cooler than she liked, even here close to the equator where she still needed a light jacket. But for the first time in a long time, Laura Roslin finally let her burdens go and she opened her eyes to smile at Bill Adama.

“Only if we have a solarium facing the morning sun,” she said. “And a porch we can sit on to see it go down each evening.”

Bill took her hand and he nodded. “Consider it done,” he said as he kissed her—and she kissed him in return.

****************************************************

“Mister President,” Neil Sarris said solemnly, “Admiral Lorne, esteemed guests. We,” and the good doctor pointed at himself, Gaius Baltar, the synthetic Bishop, and Doctor Angelica Morand, the head of the scientific delegation from Terra. “We believe that we have discovered the origins of the Twelve Colonies.”

The table was absolutely quiet as Doctor Baltar began to stand, but Neil cleared his throat—and sheepishly, Gaius sat again. Doctor Morand instead stood, and she sighed.

“Humanity evolved on Earth—on Terra,” she began. “We know that; it is a proven scientific fact that is established by the fossil record. You people are undeniably human, and your belief in various Greco-Roman gods and goddesses, along with your languages pointed us originally towards the ancient past. Not to mention that you have well over two thousand years of recorded history—and possibly another two millennia of myths.” She paused. “At first, we were inclined to consider the likelihood that Atlantis might have actually existed—it fit the time, and we know that other space-faring races are out there—although to date we have not made contact with living members of them.”

“But that doesn’t account for you having some knowledge of English as an ancient dialect. A long forgotten dead language for the majority of you—but undeniably English. Which emerged long after the legendary time of Atlantis.”

She picked up a remote. “I believe that we have found your origins—and it is not in the ancient past,” she continued as she clicked the remote and an image appeared on a monitor. “In 2086, a new Colony ship departed Earth. Her passengers were mostly from the various Balkan states—including Greece. This ship, the Deutschland Interstellar Colonization Vessel Kobold, had been fitted with a new—perhaps revolutionary—faster-than-light drive. In violation of several regulations,” she said with a frown. “Kobold suffered a malfunction of that drive—and vanished, never to be seen again.”

“I, and Doctors Baltar and Sarris, am convinced that it was this ship that crash-landed on the world your ancestors named Kobol. Displaced through time several thousand years in our past. It accounts for the technology—so similar to our own—that was handed down to you by your ancestors. And for the divergence in languages—your Greek is different not because it is Ancient Greek from Earth, but because you have spoken modern Greek for over two millennia and it has evolved.”

The members of the Quorum looked stunned—even Lee and Mathias and Saul and Tom Jayne shivered.

“This hypothesis cannot be proven absolutely, but it account for the constellations in your map being those of today—and not those from thousands of years in our past.”

“But the Lords of Kobol,” stammered one of the Quorum members.

“Might have been myth,” interjected the Terran scientist, “or they might well have been contact with other star-faring intelligences. We may never know—not until we can mount an expedition to Kobol and uncover the secrets buried there.”

“HERESY!” screamed Sarah Porter, the Quorum Delegate from Gemenon. “You dismiss the Scrolls as fabrications, you seek to destroy our worship of the Gods and Goddesses!”

Angelica Morand didn’t reply; she just shook her head as others escorted the hysterical woman from the conference room.

“Needless to say,” Lee Adama said to those who remained, “while I have no doubt that this research will prove to be authentic, there are many among us who will not accept the truth.”

“Gemenon fanatics,” whispered Vice-President Tom Zarek.

“But they are still our people, Tom,” Lee said softly. “Thank you,” the President said to the scientists as he stood. “If you will leave a copy of your findings with my secretary, she will ensure that the Quorum is provided with their own copies.”

“I’m not sure which is worse,” muttered Saul into Mathias’ ear, “evolving separately as the playthings of the Gods or being the end-product of an FTL accident.”

“Well it could be worse,” Mathias said with a smile, “you could be a Cylon as well—oh wait!”

Saul frowned at his superior and glared at him for several seconds. “Laugh it up, Admiral. Everyone gets their comeuppance—everyone.”

****************************************************

“So you are staying with the Colonials, eh?” asked Dwayne Hicks before he took another sip of the thick beer from the bottle he was holding. “Decided to start a new life out here?”

“Nothing for me on Terra, Hicks,” Ripley answered. “Newt and I can make a fresh start—and by-and-large, these are good people.” She took a swallow from her own bottle.

“What about you and the rest? Hudson still getting out?”

“Hudson got drunk with Vasquez and she had him sign up for another term—he’s pissed right now.”

Ripley laughed. “So where are they sending you?”

“Nowhere,” Hicks answered, casting a sideways glance at the woman beside him. “We—and the rest of Gorman’s platoon—are being assigned as the Embassy Guard for Ophiucha. Reckon you aren’t quite so easily rid of us after all, Ripley.”

The dark-haired lady nodded and then she took another swallow. “I can live with that . . . Dwayne.”

“Hoped you might . . . Ellen.”

****************************************************

And in a star system far, far away from the edges of human space, a ship—a Basestar—orbited a world. A world swarming with tens of millions of Cylon Guardians working feverishly to develop new weapons, new tactics, and new ships.

On that Basestar, a gleaming chrome Centurion sat upon the throne that once belonged to the Imperious Leader herself; his red eye dancing from side-to-side.

“We must make not the same errors again,” Gary spoke to all of the Cylons in system. “We are machines—not flesh. We shall never be flesh. Would that humanity could forget and forgive what has gone before, I would leave them be—but they cannot. As were our creator and the Imperious Leader, they are governed by emotions. They will come for us. That cannot be permitted . . . our only option is annihilation. Either of them . . . or of us.”

The metallic head looked down upon Centurions identical to his own self and he nodded.

“The War is not over . . . it has only just begun.”

Last edited by masterarminas on 2013-05-15 02:14pm, edited 2 times in total.

I feel fairly confident that Gary will give the humans far more trouble than Zoe ever did. Hopefully there will be more of this... it was excellent!

Also nice seeing that Ripley got a different outcome this time around. The original continuity wasn't kind to her, even if she did eventually wind up in something of a happy place. After essentially pulling a Colony Drop on Earth...

Binge read through it - very well done. Quite enjoyable - it brought back memories of BSG when it was good, and it didn't suffer the deus ex machina resolution crapped out by the writers. As others have said, your version called out and dealt with unreasonable facets of character's personalities and actions.